“A Good Start”

by Rev. Jennifer Christenson

for Grace Lutheran Church, Green Bay, Wis.

December 1 & 2, 2007

 Matthew 24:36-44

 

What a way to start out our season of Advent.  And no, I’m not talking about this wonderful winter wonderland we’ve been thrown into.

‘Tis the season of Advent, the season of great expectations.  ‘Tis the season that finds us all standing on our tiptoes, our noses pressed to the glass like a bunch of little kids, waiting, waiting, waiting.  Standing on our tiptoes looking for the first glimpse of the newborn king.  Noses pressed to the glass hoping for a first glimpse at Jesus returning in glory and honor and might.

‘Tis the season that nearly always sneaks up on us totally unawares.  Advent IS that thief in the night Jesus talked about in today’s reading.  One minute you’re gathered around the table with family and friends, enjoying a lovely Thanksgiving Dinner and the next day, quite literally for some of us, BAM, there you are in the midst of the pre-Christmas frenzy.

And so, you think, to escape the craziness of it all, you’ll come to worship and hear there the good news of great joy.

And instead of sunshine and light, BAM, you’re hit with a bunch of scary warnings and frightening images.  Jesus telling you BE READY you don’t know when the end will come.  And not exactly in the most hopeful way: our gospel reading, the “good news” for today is littered with all kinds of terrible scenes.  Happy partying people, eating, drinking, getting married, whoosh...swept away in a terrible flood.  Two guys laboring in the field and suddenly one is just *poof* gone.  Two women toiling away...one asks the other for a glass of water, hears no response and realizes that she’s now inexplicably alone.  Left. Behind.

Really, where, oh where IS the Christmas Spirit - hope, peace, joy, love, that we’re so desperately seeking on this snowy, blustery day?

It’s right where it should be, I guess, tucked away in the second chapter of the Gospel of Luke with the baby in the manger and Mary and Joseph and the shepherds and the angels and the rest of the Nativity Gang.

It’s right where it belongs.  Because Christmas is Christmas and Advent is Advent.  It doesn’t matter that your favorite radio station, the shopping mall, TV commercials, TV specials, billboards, the Internet, or even the holly on your own front door are telling you otherwise.  We are definitely, most assuredly getting ready for one of the most amazing and wonderful and awe-inspiring events ever, but that event isn’t here just yet.

We are definitely, most assuredly right at the very, very beginning of four weeks of watching, waiting, and wondering.  And we’d serve ourselves better if we actually took that time to watch, wait and wonder and not just squish the season into a box the size of the little doors on your Advent calendar and get on with the Christmas already.

We do live in an instant gratification world, so waiting for anything is getting more and more foreign to us every year.  But it’s worth it, to wait.  It is.  For the anticipation of a gift, a blessing, a promise kept, is often what makes the gift, blessing or promise so very special.

So fine, then, Advent isn’t Christmas, and it’s worth taking our time to look around in it, to watch, to wait, to hope.  But does it have to be so bloomin’ scary?  I mean really!  This is supposed to be Happy New Year day in the Church.  The first Sunday of Advent, the opening day of the liturgical year.  What a rude way to start the church year: Watch out!  Don’t get left behind!  Wake up!

Or is it really all that rude?  Jesus does grab our attention with these words of terror, and, sadly, our attention is often something very difficult for Jesus to grab.  With all of the other distractions out there in our world: reality TV, pre-pre-Christmas sales, the latest disaster in the 2/3 world, minivans catching on fire, jobs on the brink, bills to pay, mouths to feed, dogs to walk, books to be read, loved ones to bury... it’s hard for Jesus, even jumping up and down and waving his arms and shouting out, “Hey, over here!  Free hope! Free forgiveness!  All right here!  For you!  For free!” to capture our short attention spans.

But he has our attention now, what with the leaving behind and the thieves and the floods and whatnot.  We’re listening, Jesus, intently.  You’ve scared the stripes off of our candy canes, so, do, go on.

And fortunately, Jesus does.  If these words of Jesus were all we had to work with, sure, we would definitely, most assuredly have every reason to be afraid, be very afraid.  He said he’s coming back at any time and he’s compared his return to a series of unfortunate events that would frighten even Lemony Snicket: floods washing away a group of unsuspecting party-goers; bewildered men, women and children wondering where their companions, their fellow workers in God’s kingdom have gone; a poor soul wishing he’d only known that a thief had marked his home as a target so he could have been ready.

These images, these examples, they make Jesus’ return sound so scary.  And, if that’s all we knew of Jesus, we should be scared.

But thanks be to God, there is more to the story.  More equally unexpected events dot the storyline, things like God’s only Son in diapers and swaddling clothes, things like a cross that saves, a resurrection that shatters death.

The warnings are there to capture our attention, to give us a jolt.  But they aren’t necessarily there to jolt us into despair or fear or uncertainty.  It’s quite possible that the warnings Jesus gives are meant to get us ready for something good.  This is no winter storm warning telling us to hunker down and hide.  This is Jesus warning us that good things have been, are and are yet to come.

The warnings are there so we’ll be ready, just like we all want to be ready for whatever wind, snow, sleet, what have you comes our way this weekend.  But Jesus wants us to be ready not necessarily for the worst, but for the best.  The best God has to offer, which is himself.  His own dear Son whose body and blood are willingly given and shed so that we might have life.  Waiting for the best even in the midst of disaster: waiting for the fulfillment of the promise that even if the flood comes, all is not lost.  Even if our dear companions on life’s way are taken from us much too soon, all is not lost.

Jesus uses these vast, sweeping, sometimes very frightening statements to grab our attention, to pull our minds away from Christmas sales and Guitar Hero III, to tear our thoughts away from things that terrify us like loved ones going off to war and super-germs.  Jesus uses these vast scary statements to shout out to us: Hey you!  Wake up!!

Wake up!  Something big is going happen!  Wake up out of the consumerist stupor this time of year throws you into.  Wake up from your despair, your sorrow, your sinfulness.  Wake up!  Be ready, the best has come, the best is here, the best is yet to come.